


this is it.

by space_dev



Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars
Genre: Angst, F/F, Feelings, I side with Barriss fight me, Post-Episode: s05e20 The Wrong Jedi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 07:38:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14613009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/space_dev/pseuds/space_dev
Summary: It's the end, the very end, and for Barriss, the end is looking pretty damn bleak.





	this is it.

**Author's Note:**

> Title isn't from a song, it's just dramatically lowercase.

"Barriss!"

Barriss Offee, probably formerly of the Republic, probably the former Padawan of Jedi Master Luminara Undulli, looked up to see her probably former master bustling in, her usual head covering missing in favour of an obviously quickly tied on blue scarf.

"I tried to come sooner, they wouldn't let me in, oh, Barriss, is it true..?"

Barriss lowered her head, not in shame, but to spare her eyes the look on her master's face when she told her. "Yes, master, it's all true. I did it all. Everything they say."

Luminara was silent for a moment, then gently but quickly grabbed Barriss by the chin, forcing her to look up at her.

"Your eyes are still blue," Luminara said softly.

"I don't want to be a Sith, I want to be a Jedi, but not if... if the Jedi have become corrupt warmongers, I don't want to be part of them. Master, I didn't want to frame Ashoka, I did what I had to do, and she was the only one it would've worked for."

"If it'd worked..."

"I would've turned the Jedi inside out, exposed us all of our crimes."

"Do you have crimes..?"

"No. And neither does Ahsoka, or Dullard, or Kija, or Nikita, or any of the padawans, or younglings, except Ally, he's a gambler."

"Barriss, our time runs short. I have one more question to ask you," Luminara said.

"Ask away, Master."

"Did you love Ahsoka?"

"Master, I still love her, with all my heart, and I didn't want to frame her, but I did what I had to do. But I betrayed her, I betrayed my girlfriend, and I can't come back from that. I can't ever talk to her again after this."

"Mm," Luminara said. She looked Barriss straight in the eye. "I don't understand why you'd risk your stature so close to becoming a Knight, and I don't understand your love, especially for someone of the same gender as you, but I respect your love, even if I don't quite understand what you wanted to do to the Jedi Order, or why."

With that, she stepped out.

Barriss sighed and leaned her head against the wall.

She heard the door open again.

"Five minutes, Sir," she heard.

She turned to look at who'd entered, expecting it to be Anakin, to yell at her.

Yet, Ahsoka stood there, her eyes red, her padawan braid still missing.

Barriss stood up quickly and then hung her head, shuffled back towards the wall a couple feet, and this time, the head hung was most definitely done in shame.

"Ahsoka, I'm so sorry."

Ahsoka wrapped her arms around Barriss.

"Don't tell anyone I said this, but you're going to be sentenced to a Slating," Ahsoka hissed urgently. "You need to run. Take the air ducts, go to Port 997, and get on Transport Run 332 to Eriadu, it leaves at 4:50 tommorow morning. From there, choose any small, obscure backwater planet, hide out, maybe go to the witches on Alpinn to change your appearance and voice enough that you're unrecognised by authorities."

"Why... what's Slating? And why would you help me?"

"Slating is where they erase your personality and most of your memories after a crime and give you a new personality and replacement memories. Luminara will still be your master, but you'll be different. And you'll never be yourself again, you'll be fully a tool, and I know you don't want that. You need to run."

"Won't the Order punish you for helping me?"

"Barriss, they aren't going to find out, but I'm pretty sure they want to reinstate me now that I've been found not guilty, but I'm not going to accept."

"Why?"

"What you said, about the Jedi Order? It's real. And you betrayed me, that stings, but I still love you, Barriss, and hopefully, one day, we'll meet again."

"Where will you go after leaving?"

"I want to go to the University of Alderaan under a new name, get a degree, and help people. Just, not as a Jedi. And, perhaps, I'll learn the ways of the Grey Jedi. But, Alderran first, if I can."

"I'm still so, so sorry, Ahsoka."

"I know you are. And I forgive you. You did what you had to do. I respect that," Ahsoka said, reluctantly pulling away. "Until we meet again, Barriss."

"Until we meet again," Barriss agreed, holding the back of her hand to the back of Ahsoka's, touching their tiny matching concentric circle tattoos. They were something the Mirialan and Torgruta people shared, and in both cultures, it meant undying, unconditional love between two women not of the same species.

Their lips met one last time in a desperate, needy mouth embrace, and Ashoka pulled away just before the guard popped his head in, told Ahsoka it was time to go.

Ahsoka cast one last, longing look at Barriss, before turning and following the guard out, never looking back.

Barriss ducked into the vent immediately, not giving a kark about security holos or security cameras, just needing to get out to save herself.

So that one day, she and Ahsoka could meet again.

Barriss Offee, formerly of the Republic, former Padawan of Jedi Master Luminara Undulli, escaped the prison complex at 7:06 PM, approximately four hours after being convicted for bombing the Jedi temple and causing the deaths of thirteen people, four directly by her own hand, the other nine by the bomb.


End file.
